


Welcome to New York

by Khoshekh42



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, First Kiss, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-10
Updated: 2017-10-02
Packaged: 2018-10-17 08:18:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 17,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10590084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khoshekh42/pseuds/Khoshekh42
Summary: Bucky didn't die by falling off the train, but instead went down in a plane right next to Steve. When Coulson uncovers a second plane, Steve must finally confront his feelings for Bucky, with the help of John- a man in the nursing home with Peggy, Peggy herself, the rest of the Avengers, and Rebecca- the helpful local pizza girl the Avengers have taken in as their own.





	1. Chapter 1

10000 feet.

 

Steve knew that it wasn’t ‘acceptable’, so he focused his affections on Peggy, and tried to ignore anything that he might feel for his best friend. (Not that it worked well).

 

9000 feet.

 

And as the plane descended into the Arctic, he took ahold of the timepiece that had Peggy’s picture in it. But just underneath, he’d found a picture of Bucky Barnes, laughing at something that Steve had long forgotten. Bucky’s voice crackled slightly, as he could hear him radioing from the second plane.

 

8000 feet.

 

“Hey, punk.” His voice was shaky, but he tried to hide it as to not freak out Steve. Steve could tell anyway. Peggy’s voice had just disappeared from the radio, her connection to him had just failed. ‘Steve’, she had said, just before the connection died.

 

7000 feet.

 

“Buck.” Steve was crying, but he tried to hide it as to not freak out Bucky. Bucky could tell anyway.

 

“S’gonna be okay, Steve.” Nothing that they said was truthful.

 

“Yeah. Gonna be alright.” Lies.

 

“You’re gonna get that date with Peggy.” Just to try to make each other feel better.

 

6000 feet.

 

“Yeah. You’re gonna drop me off, right?” Steve just needed Bucky to keep talking. 

 

To keep his voice on the radio. And Steve could bear through this.

 

“Course I will. I’m with ya’ ‘till the end of the line, kid. Remember that.”

 

“Yeah. I’m with you ‘till the end of the line too.”

 

5000 feet.

 

“Steve, know that this shouldn’t be you. You shouldn’t go out yet. But if you were to go out in any way, it should be like this. Saving an entire city.”

 

“Naw, Buck. I don’t matter-”

 

“No.” Bucky’s voice was harsh.

 

4000 feet.

 

“You do matter Steve. You matter to a hell of a lot of people. You matter to Peggy, you matter to Howard, you matter to America, and you matter to me. You are my best friend,”

 

3000 feet.

 

“And even if we’re both about to die, you are the most important person in my life.”

 

Steve felt choked up, and breathing was louder than it usually was, as he was sure that Bucky could hear it. “No. Bucky, I’m not that important. I’m just a kid from Brooklyn.”

 

2000 feet.

 

Steve slipped the picture of Peggy out of the timepiece, so he could see both of their faces. “But you mean the world to me Bucky. I’d be dead if not for you. I’d’ve died long before I became Captain America.” Bucky let out a short laugh.

 

1000 feet.

 

“And you’ve saved my life too, Steve. And it’s more than just those times that you are the world to me.”

 

500 feet.

 

Bucky's voice came back panicked. “Steve, I-”

 

The radio cut out.

 

150 feet.

 

“BUCKY!” It was then that Steve was overcome by a horrifying wave of panic and terror. Right when he lost his friend. Just because Bucky’s plane had been just a few hundred feet ahead of him. Bucky was dead.

 

0 feet.


	2. Chapter 2

Steve’s eyes opened blearily. People say that you get a moment of peace as soon as you wake up, just before you remember everything. But that wasn’t the case for Steve. Steve just woke up depressed. It was just a couple days after the Chitari invasion, and Steve was just being allowed to process what had happened in the past few weeks. He’d lost his best friend. He’d lost his almost girlfriend. He’d lost his entire world.

 

Seeing Tony Stark was too much, he looked too much like Howard. If he seemed tense around him, then he hoped that Tony wasn’t going to take it too personally. He didn’t want to drag himself out of this new bed in the morning. He just wanted to cry. But he didn’t. He wanted to seem strong.

 

Peggy was still alive, he’d been told. He went and visited her. She’d been surprised that he was alive twice. He’d stayed strong for Peggy, but once he’d left the room, he’d just broken down and started crying on the chairs in the main room. An old man had come over and comforted him. Then he’d told Steve that it was his inspirational propaganda videos that had gotten him through the war. Steve had been astonished. That people actually had looked up to him. It made him think of Bucky.

 

“Oh…” Steve barely breathed, but the old man clearly noticed that something was wrong.

 

“What is it?”

 

“Just… Something you said… made me think of an old friend.”

 

“Would you like to talk about it?” The old man was so kind about it.

 

“You probably don’t know him. Bucky Barnes.”

 

“Oh of course! James Buchanan Barnes. He was your friend before and during the war.” Steve blinked a couple of times. “You know who he is?”

 

“Of course. He went down in the plane next to yours. He’s nearly as famous as you now.”

 

Steve was shocked, but glad that Bucky got the recognition that he deserved. “Bucky was a good man.” And Steve had fallen in love with him. And Steve knew that it was ‘wrong’. And he hated it. He hated that it was ‘wrong’, and he hated that he’d fallen for his best friend.

 

“You know,” the old man told him, starting to smile, obviously in an attempt to cheer Steve up. “There are people that think you and Mr. Barnes were actually an item.” Steve’s head jerked up, and he looked terrified. Who had found out? Steve started stuttering. “But- but isn’t that, isn’t that…” Steve looked shocked. The old man laughed. “Yes, coming from the forties might make you think that, I suppose, but here in twenty-fifteen, people are a lot more accepting of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community. Steve blinked several times. “Seriously?” The man nodded. Steve paused for a moment, and started slowly smiling. He laughed. “That’s great!” The old man tilted his head.

 

“Really. It’s great that society has come far enough to realize that it really doesn’t matter who you love or who you are. There are so many people that think that who you love defines who you are and what kind of person that are, but honestly it’s great that people now are more accepting. I, Bucky, and Howard definitely never cared about that sort of thing. Howard, uh… At some point, Bucky actually figured out that Howard had a bit of a thing for me, he was actually really pissed that no one thought that he was more attractive when we walked around anymore." The old man started laughing too. “I have a feeling that conservatives are going to take too kindly to who you actually are.”

 

They were silent for a few minutes. Steve was very quiet. Then, very quietly, the man asked, “You really loved Bucky Barnes didn’t you?” Steve bent his head, and that told the man everything that he needed to know. The man patted him on the shoulder. “I know what it means to lose someone that you truly love. I was in the war.”

 

“B- but… why Bucky? Why couldn’t I have died and come back to find that he’d lived a long and happy life, and gotten married to a woman he loved, maybe that woman, Clara, that he brought to the Stark Expo. But he went down in the plane just a couple seconds before mine did. I heard him cut out on the radio. He sounded panicked and desperate when he said ‘Steve, I-’, and that was the last thing he said to me. I heard my best friend die. It’s horrible. I lost all hope. And it was at that point that I didn’t want to live anymore.” The man patted his back. 

 

Steve cried, somehow not afraid to show his emotions in front of this man. Steve sighed. “I’m sorry. I really should go.” He stood up to leave, but as he was just about to leave, he turned around, “Hey, what’s your name? I’d like to come and visit you some time.”

 

“John Millen.”

 

“Thanks. For listening.”

 

“No bother. It’s nice to know that I can help Captain America.” John smiled. Steve nodded his thanks. He walked out, turning back to look at Peggy’s room, feeling a pang of sadness in his chest. He silently told her that he was sorry.


	3. Chapter 3

Steve got back to the tower, looking depressed, and nobody asked him about it. He went up to his room and looked on the internet about what he and John had talked about with the whole (as he found out) LGBT thing. And he searched for Bucky Barnes, and found that yes, Bucky was famous. He also got rather pissed with any of the websites that implied that Bucky was less than he ever was. He fell asleep soon after. He was sleeping more and more. He was more and more depressed.

 

Peggy had Alzheimer’s.

 

Howard had died long ago.

 

Bucky was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

Three months later, Steve was back to his normal sassy self. Perhaps he was a little bit stiffer, a little bit more secluded. Every Saturday, Steve went to the nursing home to talk to John Millen. To talk, to discuss things. He was happier now. They both were. The nurses told Steve that John was better. He had no family anymore, and Steve coming to visit made him happier, and caused him to eat more. Peggy wasn’t doing any better. But he still visited her too every Saturday.

He was always going into interviews now. People wanting to talk to Captain America. The first Avenger. There was now an interview that the Avengers liked to call ‘The Interview’. Tony had ‘The Press Conference’, and Steve had ‘The Interview’. It was one that included all of the Avengers.

 

‘So,’ The reporter had asked, ‘Coming from the 1940’s which is was a very unaccepting time period, how do you feel about the new acceptance of gay rights and gay marriage?’ Steve had grinned. Ever since he had talked to John for the first time, he’d been waiting for a time when a reporter would ask him that question. ‘Oh it’s great!’ The reporters looked a bit taken aback by Steve’s enthusiasm.

 

‘It’s great that everyone is so much more accepting. Everyone seems to be so understanding of everyone. The entire LGBT community is very open now, and it’s so great.'

 

‘So, you agree with gay rights and gay marriage?’

 

‘Have I not made myself obvious enough? Of course I do! As I’ve mentioned, 

 

Tony’s dad was in love with me, and I was fine with that.’

 

‘Still shoulda seen that.’ Tony had grumbled. Everyone laughed.

 

‘Honestly, it’s great that people are so open about their sexuality and gender identity. But it’s horrible that people feel bad enough of the few people that are homophobic, biphobic, or transphobic, for them to commit suicide, it’s absolutely disgusting.’

 

‘People normally just generalize as homophobic and transphobic. What do you mean by biphobic?’

 

Internally, Steve had grinned. Because they had been playing right into his hands.

‘Biphobia. People who aren’t actually scared of bisexual people, but are disproving of what bisexuality is. And, if you don’t understand, bisexuality means that you can be attracted to both men and women.’

 

‘So a mixture of heterosexuality and homosexuality?’ The reporter asked innocently, and she had had no idea what she had been playing into.

 

Steve had laughed incredulously. ‘No. Bisexuality is a different thing altogether. Like, chips is completely different from cookies and cake, and it’s not a combination of the two.’ At that point, Clint had interjected saying that that he was hungry. Steve had ignored that.

 

‘But, eventually you could settle down and have a partner, and surely-’

 

‘If you’re about to say that you have to decide once you settle down, then no. That’s wrong. There’s this great actor Anna Paquin, who said that even if you’re straight, and you settle down, it doesn’t change your sexuality any.’

 

The reporter had stared at him interestedly. The rest of the Avengers had decided that it was probably best for Steve to continue without interruption.

 

‘But surely if you’re labeling yourself as ‘bisexual’ then you just haven’t figured out who you like yet?’

 

Steve had just stared at her, stuttering a bit. ‘No.’ He had then said, ‘We are not confused. We haven’t ‘not yet chosen’, we know that we’re attracted to both men and women.’ The Avengers had then started grinning and still staying silent. The reporter had then been very quiet for a very long time.

 

‘Are you saying…’ She had finally said, ‘That you are… bisexual?’

 

‘Yes.’

 

And with that, the entirety of America had exploded.

 

But it was now quite a while after that interview, and everyone knew that Steve was bi. No one really cared anymore, and the media had moved on to other celebrities.

 

Still, meanwhile, Coulson was on the phone. Later, Steve would come to think that that phone call was one of the most important phone calls he would ever hear about.

 

Coulson immediately went to Avengers Tower, with a grim expression.

 

*:*:*:*:*

 

 

“Sir.” Jarvis’s voice rang out in the silence. “Agent Coulson wants to talk to Mr. Rogers. He says that it’s urgent.” The room became tense. Tony eventually spoke up. “Alright… Send him up then.”

 

“Already on his way, sir.” Everyone glanced around, not sure of what to say. They mostly looked at Steve. Steve shrugged. The elevator doors opened. Coulson walked in, still looking grim.

 

“Steve.”

 

Steve looked worried.

 

“I just got a phone call. It was from some SHEILD agents who travel around the world.”

 

“Yes?” Steve’s voice was shaking.

 

“They were in the Arctic. They found another plane. From the 1940’s.”

 

“Oh. Oh. Oh God… Do they… do they think that it’s Bucky?” His voice was shaking even more.

 

“That is what they are thinking.”

 

“Oh God.” Steve blinked. “I want to go with.” Coulson nodded. “You may. We’re going to leave in three days. I’m sorry if that’s a bit of a short notice, but we are on a time schedule. We’ll come back to pick you up then.” Coulson’s voice had melted into sadness, and empathy.

 

Steve went into his room.


	5. Chapter 5

Coulson came back to collect Steve three days later. It was all relatively quiet for those few days. Everyone generally avoided Steve, not wanting to bother him. Steve was absolutely silent for those days.

 

He was silent on the way to the Arctic. Coulson didn’t bother talking to him, because he knew that Steve wanted quiet.

 

All that Steve had been able to do for the past three days was think about Bucky. 

 

He’d always known that Bucky was dead, but somehow this made the whole thing all more final. If he could feel Bucky’s face or hands again… He didn’t know. Steve bent his head down, so that Coulson wouldn’t see him cry.

 

*:*:*:*:*

 

 

They landed in the Arctic, and there was still a good number of daylight hours left.

 

“Steve.” Coulson spoke to him softly. “Do you want a minute alone before we go out to look at the plane?” Steve nodded. Coulson walked out of the plane on his own.

 

Bucky. He was going to see Bucky’s body today. Steve took a deep breath.

His best friend.

 

Bucky.

 

Steve stepped out of the plane, feeling the cold biting his face.

 

He walked to the remnants of the plane. He hadn’t yet gotten to the plane, but already he knew that it was Bucky’s plane.

 

Steve forced himself to continue walking towards the plane. Coulson noticed that Steve was coming up, and vaguely nudged the woman with a very poofy jacket next to him. She glanced in Steve’s direction, and moved out of the way. Coulson and the woman bowed their heads. He got directly up to the plane before looking down into it.

 

Bucky.

 

Oh God.

 

Shit.

 

It was Bucky.

 

It was so obviously Bucky.

 

And that terrified him.

 

He looked exactly like he did seventy years before.

 

It was Bucky Barnes.

 

“Oh God.” Steve pressed his hands up against his mouth.

 

Steve didn’t even stop to think why he should look so much like he did, but seventy years later.


	6. Chapter 6

Steve walked back to the plane, he couldn’t handle seeing Bucky like that. 

 

Coulson turned to the woman beside him once Steve had gone far enough away not to be able to hear him. “Simmons, why might he look like that? Even if the ice slowed down the process, in a normal circumstance, it would’ve had more affect than this.”

 

Simmons nodded, “It really isn’t the proper biological state for being in the ice for so long. He looks like…”

 

“Yes.” Coulson looked even grimmer now. “That’s what I was thinking.”

 

“What are you going to tell Steve? How are you going to tell him that his best friend…”

 

“I don’t know. Still, we have to wait until we know for sure. Otherwise… I just don’t know if he could handle the false hope at this point.” Coulson looked dejected, and he really didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what to do at all.

Eventually a man wandered over,

 

“Fitz.” Simmons approached the man, who was wearing at least four more layers of winter jackets than Simmons was. He was still shivering.

 

“I hate the Arctic. I can’t stand it. I thought winters in New York were bad, this is insufferable.”

 

“Fitz. It’s no use complaining about it. But that’s not the point. Look. At Bucky.” 

 

Fitz’s face twisted, “I don’t want to look at a dead body.”

 

“Just look.” Simmons was now removing objects from around the body, scraps of metal that had been dislodged around the plane in the crash. Fitz obeyed, still looking rather unsettled.

 

“Is this just me, or does he look rather…?”

 

“Fresh? Yeah.” Simmons seemed much more okay with getting near the body than Fitz did.

 

“Not the word I would’ve used, but that works. And the current working theory?”

 

“Steve.” Coulson answered, in the calm, but concerned voice that he commonly sported. “Steve didn’t age at all during his time in the ice.” Fitz looked confused for a while, until his eyes bulged and he understood, “Are you…. Are you saying that Bucky Barnes is some sort of... Super soldier that the world didn’t know about?”

 

“You asked for the current working theory.” Coulson shrugged, even more grim than he did when he’d first come to Steve with the news that they had found Bucky’s plane. “I have to contact Fury. Or Hill. Someone, at least. They’ll want to know.” Fitzsimmons nodded, and allowed Coulson to walk back to the bus, and Fitz went with, to get out of the cold. Simmons stayed to continue looking at Bucky’s body.

 

Fitz and Coulson got to the bus, avoiding going near the room that they’d assigned to Steve when he’d first gotten onto the bus, assuming that he would want and need some alone time after seeing Bucky. They thought that now more than ever. What must Steve think was going on? How vivid must the flashbacks feel? How much must it hurt to see your best friend dead, after so long, in perfect clarity?

 

They split once they got inside the bus, Coulson going to the communications room, and Fitz to his own room, to turn on the heater, warm up a bit, and vow that he was never going to go to the Arctic, or even the Antarctic again.

 

Coulson, meanwhile, had just gotten Hill on the line, and May was listening intently to figure out what was going on. Coulson hadn’t told her, he was too busy trying to get someone on the line to talk to. From what she could figure out, the body that they had found in the plane wreckage was definitely Bucky Barnes’s, but it hadn’t deteriorated, and looked very similar to when Coulson had come to find Captain America’s body in the plane. Because of course he’d been part of the team to try to find Steve, even if his excuse was that he should come because he was the head of the team trying to put together the Avenger’s.


	7. Chapter 7

Coulson was able to discretely get Bucky's body back to New York. He wanted to make sure that Bucky actually was modified to be a second super soldier before he got Steve excited with the idea that his best friend was alive. 

The test results came back. Positive. Bucky Barnes was alive. 

Coulson insisted that he be the one to tell Steve, and quickly got his way. 

So that's how he came to be standing nervously in he lobby of Avenger's tower, waiting to be told to enter the elevator by JARVIS. As soon as the smooth British voice came on, and the elevator door slid open, Coulson's heart fluttered, and he was heading up to see the Avengers. 

Steve hadn't been doing well since he arrived back at the tower. He still visited the nursing home every Saturday to see Peggy and John, yet that was just for their sakes. So naturally, when JARVIS told him that Agent Coulson had come to talk to the Avengers (him specifically), he wandered to the living room with a suspicious air. 

"Steve." Coulson was already there when Steve got there. "We have done testing to make sure, and he had our suspicions, but I wanted to be sure before I raised your hopes. The tests have come back. Bucky Barnes was, like you, a super solider, and preserved in the ice."

"What are you trying to say?" Steve's voice was shaking. 

"Bucky Barnes is alive." Coulson concluded with a small smile. "He's at headquarters." 

Steve stood there, staring at Coulson. And he ran out the door, and soon out the building.

Steve kept running. He kept running and running and running. To the SHIELD headquarters. To Bucky. To his best friend. To the man that he still loved. Always loved. He didn't want a cab, he would have to sit still and he felt like running to the moon and back. He didn't want to run. He might be Captain America, but it was still slower than a cab. He gave in and hailed a cab, realizing it was unrealistic and stupid to think that he could run all he way to headquarters. Steve muttered the address as he slid into the backseat. 

He had been right. Steve wasn't completely still for more than three seconds through the entire ride. Steve sprinted inside the building when he got there. He turned to the first person he saw, a short girl who reminded him remarkably of Clint. "Hey!" He shouted, "You in the purple." If he'd been paying attention he would've seen at least five people look down at their shirts. The girl looked up at him, eyes wide, a muttered "holy futz, it's Captain America" on her tongue. The girl next to her rolled her eyes, "whatcha need, chico?" 

"Where's director Fury?" The panic and excitement inside if him were bubbling up, and he'd look terrified on minute, and grinning the next. The girl in purple shrugged, but the one who'd actually responded told her he was in a meeting. 

"Thank you so much." And Steve sprinted off in the direction of the meeting hall, earning stares from people around him. He burst into the room, everyone turned to look at him. 

 

Coulson was close behind Steve, having left quite a bit after he had, explaining a few things to the rest of the Avengers. But since Steve had run part of the way, and however fast the super soldier was, the SHIELD car was still faster. He came in quickly, turning to the first people he saw. "You! In the purple." She turned around, slightly exasperated. "What do YOU want?" Coulson seemed slightly taken aback by her rudeness. "Have you seen Captain America?" The purple girl rolled her eyes, "I swear to God, everyone's looking for someone. Cap's looking for Fury, you're looking for Cap. Honestly. He's in the meeting room. That's where we sent him looking for the director anyway." Coulson nodded, and hurried off to find Steve. 

"Rogers! Here you are, we were waiting. Where's Coulson?" Fury shouted. He always seemed to be shouting. Coulson came in, smiling when he saw that Steve had found his way. 

"Where's Bucky?" Steve demanded immediately. Fury glared at him to sit down. Steve didn't move, but daringly glared back. Someone sucked in air through their teeth, afraid of what Fury would do to Steve.

"Barnes is safe." Fury responded, apparently not going to kill the first Avenger. Steve relaxed visibly, but still didn't move. "Where is he?" It was less of a question this time, and more of a demand. Fury sighed. "Fine. But only a few minutes, because we've got to figure out what the hell we're going to do with him."

It was not just a few minutes. Steve first saw Bucky, lying on the bed, and hooked up to several machines, and Coulson could tell that Steve didn't plan to move from there until Bucky had woken up, and was allowed to go outside. And that's exactly what Steve did. He plonked himself down in one of he uncomfortable waiting chairs outside of the room, pulling it up to he window (he wasn't yet allowed in the room, but when he was, he dragged that chair next to the bed, and didn't move from it save for eating sparingly, and visiting the restroom even less). 

Avengers would stop by and say hi to Steve and to check in on Bucky. Steve looked horrible. He has huge bags under his eyes as if he hadn't slept for days (he hadn't), and looked constantly worried for Bucky's sake. Nat visited to tell Steve that he needed to eat, just to have Steve tell her that he didn't need to eat. 

He had the vending machine anyway. 

"That's not real food and you know it."

"But it's here, Nat. I'm not leaving." The 'Not until he wakes up, and I know he's okay' was left unsaid, but obvious. Natasha smiled. "That's why I brought food." Steve looked up, confused. Rebecca stood in he doorway with a pizza box in hand. Steve didn't know what to say. 

"Thank Rebecca. She's the one that had the idea." Natasha told him, stepping behind the young redhead. She shrugged. "I figured you'd want real food. Free of charge." Steve stuttered a bit. "I- no I'll pay. Really." She shook her head. "No, I'm worried about you Steve. You're not paying, but you're eating this nice hot pizza because you need food that's not crappy SHIELD vending machine food." She silenced him with a glare. Steve pulled out his wallet anyway and gave her a fifty. She tried to hand it back, but Steve refused. "No, if you aren't letting me pay for the pizza, you're getting a tip." He paused. "This is the biggest bill I have right now. Sorry." She chuckled, "Hey, you guys are pretty much paying my way through college. My parents thank you." She put the pizza on the side table, glanced at Bucky, and left. Natasha stayed for a moment, then left without a word, face void of emotion. Still, Steve sensed she was worried for him. Steve turned his attention back to Bucky, and suddenly the emotions were overwhelming, and he felt like he was suffocating. For the first time in weeks, Steve slipped out the door, and made his way to the exit. Rain hit his face as he stepped out, and Steve nearly flinched for forgetting what the outside actually felt like. He soon acclimatized and ran to catch a cab. 

He arrived at the nursing home, still overwhelmed and choking on everything that was happening. "Hey is John still in the same room?" The receptionist recognized him, and broke into a grin, "Course, honey. Both he and and Peggy were looking for ya, ya know? You've been gone for so long, what's takin' ya?" She patted his arm. Steve smiled distractedly at her, and hurried his way to the second floor. He knocked on John's door, and opened when he heard a consenting voice from past it. John's face seemed to light up when Steve came in, and Steve was able to breathe a little easier. "Hey, John. Sorry I haven't been for a few weeks, I- uh. I've been distracted."

"I can tell." He gestured to Steve's growing beard. "But you've come to tell an old man your woes?" John didn't seem to mind that Steve hadn't been for a while, but glad he was there now. Steve smiled sheepishly. "Yeah, pretty much. You don't mind do you?" John laughed, "I didn't mind the first time, did I?"

"No, I suppose you didn't..." He trailed off a bit. "Uh. You know how I was talking about Bucky?" John nodded. 

"You can keep a secret, right? Because this is... Definitely classified." Steve looked up at John, still very nervous, but catching the old man's eyes boldly. 

"I promise I won't tell a soul. You have me intrigued now."

"So I was telling you about how they found his plane and all, but a couple weeks ago, one of the SHIELD agents that was there- the one that told me about Buck's plane in the first place. He... Came back to the tower." Steve smiled tentatively. 

“And he said..." And all of the emotions that Steve had been holding back flooded over. He choked back a sob, whether it was from fear, or exhaustion, Steve couldn't tell. "He said that Bucky was still alive." John's eyebrows shot up, keeping a comforting hand on Steve's arm. 

"That he's some sort of second super soldier, and he's been in some sort of coma. I'd been basically staying in the same room, by his side, and I plan on going back and staying there until he wakes up. But I don't know when he'll wake up... If he'll wake up. And every day I expect them to tell me that he's dead, and none of this was real. I- I just needed to talk to someone." They sat there in silence for a few moments. 

"Well. I can't say that I can understand what you're going through. I'm pretty sure you're the only one who's really gone through this. But, I can sympathize, I suppose. Do the doctors or SHIELD agents and whatever think he'll wake up?"

"They don't know. They can only base things off of me, and they don't know how Bucky got to be a super soldier, and whether it worked the same as it did for me." 

"So they don't know how he could've become a super soldier? That seems like the kind of thing people would document." Steve nodded, and shrugged, "There's no... Uh, no- no- no..." Steve trailed off, slightly confused looking. "Oh. Oh- oh God. I know what happened." Steve looked up at John, eyes wide and frightened, 

"It was Hydra. It was fucking Hydra." Steve's suddenly venomous tone, and small outburst startled John. 

"Sorry, I need to go. Thank you, really. I think I needed to get outside, and I really needed for talk." John waved it off, "I'll always be here to talk to. You do what you need to." Steve smiled apologetically, and turned to the door to leave.

"Do promise me one thing." Steve looked back at the sound of John's voice. "Of course. Anything."

"Two things really. First if you could bring Mr. Barnes around here when he's woken up, at some point so I can finally see him after hearing so much about him. And then... Do tell him sometime." Steve flushed, knowing what he was talking about, referencing to their first conversation when he'd accidentally spilled a bit more of his soul than he'd wanted to share. Steve shrugged, "It'll just make things awkward."

"Perhaps it's just the old- very old- romantic in me, but I think that there might be more to this than you think. And when it happens, I'd like to know perhaps, before it’s on the morning television." Seeing Steve's expression, John sighed, but amended the offending word. "Fine, IF it happens. You have no faith. Now to, tell the secret government about your breakthrough." Steve smiled again, and finally slipped out the door, head swimming with ideas and notions. 

He returned to the headquarters to several people surprised that Steve was coming through the front door. He explained his whole Hydra theory to Coulson, and found his way back to the familiar chair in the room Bucky was in. 

"Hey Bucky." Steve greeted him. He sighed. "God. This is so cliché. You'd probably punch me if you were awake. But... God, how do they do this in the movies."

Steve took a deep breath and looked up at the ceiling. "I love you, Buck." Steve pulled a pained look, and his head fell into his hands. 

Steve wasn't a person who was prone to crying, but recently... Recently was different. Bucky. Recently had Bucky. And somehow Bucky always had the power to make him cry- even when presumed dead, or lying in a coma. 

Steve began to cry again. 

Natasha stopped back by soon. She looked disapprovingly at the unopened pizza box. "Honestly Steve. You eat more than any of us. Except maybe Thor. You need to eat." Steve looked sheepish, "I had a cookie at a nursing home today?" She rolled her eyes, "At least you left the building." Natasha handed him the pizza box. He took it, and had soon eaten the entirety of it. Natasha was right. He was hungry, and he needed to eat. He told her that he would stop by the cafeteria later that day- not just the vending machine. She seemed pleased enough with that, and left him alone. 

The cliché in movies is that the person in the coma always wakes up when the person keeping watch at their bedside is asleep or away. It wasn't like that with Steve and Bucky. With them, Steve was still awake and vigilant at his bedside. 

There was a groan, and Steve shot up with super soldier reflexes. "Bucky?" His voice was trembling with fear and excitement. 

"Steve? That you?" The voice was small, and Steve could barely hear it, but it was there. Steve didn't think that he would ever stop grinning. "Yeah. Bucky. You're awake. You're alive. Bucky." And Steve, for the third time in that one day, started crying. 

"You crying?" Bucky was starting to shift in the bed, and he'd opened his eyes blearily. 

"Uh, yeah... I suppose I am. God. Bucky."

"Stop crying Steve. ‘M fine." Bucky was trying to sit up, but Steve put a hand firmly on his shoulder, "No, you need to rest. Keep your energy."

"Geez Steve." His voice was getting stronger. "I've been resting for however long I've been in... Wherever here is. How long have I been passed out?"

"Uh... About that..." Steve rubbed the back of his neck nervously. 

"For that matter, how am I alive?" Bucky was beginning to sound panicked. "And no offense, but how are you alive? We both went down with our planes." 

"Bucky... Please calm down. We're okay. You're okay. Uh, Can I ask you something? That might be hard?" While he was telling Bucky to calm down, Steve was sounding pretty nervous himself. Bucky nodded. 

"When you were kidnapped by Hydra, did they... Experiment? On... You?" Bucky looked uncomfortable. "I... It wasn't really the first thing on my mind to tell you." Steve nodded, "That's all I needed. We don't need to think about that."

"It's not THAT fucking traumatic, Steve. I'd kinda like to know how long I've been out." Bucky seemed glad to not talk about it though. 

"You've been out for seventy-two... Uh-"

"Please tell me that's hours. Have I really missed months? More than a year?"

"You didn't let me finish, Buck." Steve sounded sad, and Bucky looked at him warily. 

"You've been out for about seventy-two... Years."

There was silence following Steve's statement. 

"You're fucking with me." Bucky whispered this, and Steve just knew that he knew that it was the truth. 

"I'm sorry." Something seemed to click in Bucky's eyes. "Who's dead?" Steve didn't say anything. 

"Steve? Who's dead?" 

"Everyone." More silence. 

"Peggy's still here, but... She's not well." Bucky nodded slowly. "Howard?" 

"He's gone, but he has a son named Tony."

"Can I see it?" Bucky blurted out, "Everything? Where are we even?"

"We're in New York." Steve told him, glad that their conversation about who was dead was over, because he'd had the same conversation with Fury when he'd arrived, except Fury had been a lot more blunt with him. Steve wasn't sure if Bucky could go outside, but his instincts said that he wasn't ready yet. "How about I open the blinds?" That way he didn't have Bucky out of his bed already. 

There was a moment of panic when Bucky didn't answer, only to realize that he'd just fallen asleep. Steve smiled, and adjusted the sheets to make it more comfortable for his friend. 

From the moment that Bucky woke up, there were SHIELD agents that were wanting to go in and question him. Coulson had had to physically restrain one of them. "Bucky will talk when he is ready. You will not bombard him with questions before he's somewhat comfortable with the fact that he's alive and in the twenty-first century."


	8. Chapter 8

Steve stayed until Bucky woke again. He still seemed disoriented, and he was a bit quiet when he remembered everything. But he seemed to want to put that to the back of his mind, and finally see 2015 New York. Steve pulled him out of bed, and took him over to the window in the room that had its curtains drawn. Steve was fretting so much that Bucky punched him softly on the arm, "I just wanna to see the future, Steve."

 

"You ready for this?"

 

"Nope." Bucky told him quite truthfully. Steve grinned and pulled the curtains back dramatically. "Welcome to New York." Bucky had been right. He wasn't ready for this. He pressed his forehead up against the glass, trying to get as close to it all as possible. "People can... Fly? In the future?" Steve rolled his eyes, "Oh that'll just be... Not Tony." He disregarded his first theory. "You have GOT to be kidding me." Steve pulled out the Stark phone, and hit a couple of buttons. His phone blared to life with loud horns, and a calm voice saying 'Avengers Assemble!' Over and over.

 

"Steve... What is-?"

 

"That flying person was a... Villain? Super villain? I dunno. I- uh, listen, I'll explain in a sec, I really need to go right now. Um, hold my phone."

 

"Wait this is a phone? Steve, what's going on?" But Steve was already off, telling Coulson to look after Bucky.

 

Soon, all of the Avengers had gathered on the scene, while Bucky had escaped Coulson, and was standing outside, amazed by what was happening with the 

Avengers. It was a quick battle, though, but with enough damage that Tony would have to end up paying at least half of it. Steve's face lit up and fell simultaneously (Bucky really wanted to know how he pulled that off) when he saw Bucky. "I told you to stay inside."

 

"You fucking kidding me?" Bucky scoffed at him, "You're fighting some freakin' villain, and you think I'm gonna stay inside?" Steve pulled him into a tight hug, as though he weren't going to ever let to. "Welcome back, Bucky."

 

"I'm Tony." Iron Man walked up, holding out his hand. Natasha shoved him lightly, muttering something about 'let them have their moment.' And 'idiot.' Bucky turned to look at him. "Uh... Steve, didn't you say Howard's son was named Tony?"

 

"Yeah. That's him. Take of the mask, stop trying to scare Bucky." The mask raised, and Tony revealed his actual face.

 

"Jesus. You look exactly like Howard." He took Tony's hand. Tony scowled at the comparison to his father. He quickly bounced back and started introducing everyone. "This is Bruce Banner AKA the Hulk." Bruce waved, looking uncomfortable at the fact that he had no shirt. (Clint found one and tossed it to him).

 

"This is Clint Barton AKA Hawkeye." He waved.

 

"This is Natasha Romanoff AKA Black Widow." Natasha waved sheathing a knife that she still had from the battle.

 

"This is Thor AKA Thor." Thor waved heartily, beaming.

 

"He's a Norse... God?" Bucky asked. Steve nodded, "Not a myth." Bucky nodded slowly.

 

"This is Steve Rogers AKA Captain America." Steve rolled his eyes, "Hey, nice to meet you Mr. Barnes." He stuck his hand out for Bucky to shake.

 

"Hello Mr. Rogers, you can call me Bucky." Bucky shook his hand enthusiastically.

 

"And I'm Tony Stark AKA Iron Man." He waved.

 

"And I'm starving." Clint interrupted.

 

"I concur."

 

"Concur? Nobody says that Tony." Clint rolled his eyes at Tony. "But beside Tony, we're getting pizza, come on. Bucky, you're coming with." Steve opened his mouth to object.

 

"Steve." Bucky nearly whined, "I've had nothing to eat but stuff in a tube and that Coulson dude gave me some piss poor cafeteria food. I'm getting a frickin' pizza." Steve sighed, but gave in. Still, he stuck to Bucky's side until they arrived at Paul's Pizza. Bucky had been marveling everything they passed, and Tony claimed responsibility for nearly everything.

 

"Tony!" Natasha finally exclaimed, "This is ridiculous. You have nothing to do with the Empire State Building." Tony looked slightly sheepish at that, and finally shut up.

 

"Trust me," Clint assured Bucky as they arrived, and Clint pulled open the door, 

 

"This is the best pizza you will ever eat."

 

"Ohmigosh guys!" A redheaded woman squealed and barreled into Clint. She quickly drew back. "Eww... You smell bad." Several of them laughed at Clint.

 

"Yeah, well, fighting bad guys does that to you."

 

She glanced at everyone, and when she saw Bucky she squeaked and her eyes grew as wide as pizzas. "The usual, guys?" Her voice was several octaves higher than normal, and when they nodded, she ran off quickly and without a word. Bucky seemed very confused. "What was that about?"

 

"Oh..." Steve said, somewhat sheepishly. "You might be a bit... Uh... Famous." He concluded, slightly apologetically.

 

"Me? I'M famous?"

 

"Well, you went down with a plane, just like I did." Steve answered, shrugging as if it were no big deal. Bucky snorted. "Yeah, well you're Captain freaking America, so I doubt I measure up to that very well."

 

Clint chimed in, "You have an exhibit in the Smithsonian." Bucky seemed fairly shocked, but tried to mask it slightly. "Bet it's in the Captain America exhibit though."

 

"Sure but-"

 

"Wait they actually have a Captain America exhibit?" Bucky laughed, "That was just a joke!"

 

"Yeah, they've got a buncha stuff. Few crappy drawings of mine."

 

"Not crappy. Your drawings are fucking incredible." Bucky told him, quite earnestly. "Forget Smithsonian, your drawings should be in god damn art museum." Steve looked down at the table they'd seated themselves at, embarrassed. "I'll take you there, you can see that yes, you are famous."

 

"I'll have to see some of these supposedly 'crappy' doodles of yours."

 

"No!" Steve shouted, and as soon as he did, he knew it was too quick. "They're, uh, really really bad."

 

"God Steve. Stop. You're drawings are FINE. Stop trying to say otherwise."

Steve wasn't going to say the real reason that he didn't want Bucky to see his drawings at the museum. He'd drawn Bucky himself one day, a drawing that'd taken him two months to finish. It was just pencil, but the portrait was full of passion and... Love that he was terrified that Bucky would see the emotion that had gone into it. It was the one thing he wished that hadn't been put in the museum. That and the watch. The watch that he'd kept Peggy and Bucky's picture in. They had the watch, but the pictures had long been destroyed by time. 

Honestly, Steve wasn't sure how they'd even gotten the watch, since he'd gotten most of his personal things. Yet somehow, he hadn't gotten the watch. He didn't mind that much, though, since the photos were gone.

 

"Steve?" Bucky waved a hand in front of his face, "You there?" Steve snapped back to reality. "Yeah. Yeah, sorry... I, uh, was thinking about other things." 

 

Natasha peered at him strangely from her place at the table.

 

"Uh." Came an unexpected squeak, "The usual, guys." She was carrying two pizzas, as were two other people behind her. Clint positively beamed, "Mm! Thank God! Here," he offered, "Sit down." He dragged a chair from another table, and put it next to him. She blushed. "No, I have to, uh-"

 

"Sit!" Bucky beamed at her. She made some sort of strangling noise, but sat down.

 

"So," Bucky said, looking back at Steve. "What's changed?" Steve laughed, 

 

"God, everything's different."

 

"The government still gone to shit?"

 

"Yep." Bucky waved his hand, "Ah, well, it can't be too different."

 

"Well aliens attacked New York." Steve told him way too casually for Bucky's taste. Bucky raised his eyebrows. "Well. That is different." Steve began suddenly talking very animatedly and excitedly. "Everything's a lot more equal for everyone. People of different races, gender, gender identity, sexuality, And it's all great, and-"

 

"Noooooo...!" Tony moaned, "Please don't get Steve started on another one of his social justice rants."

 

"Really, once he gets on one of those, you can NEVER stop him. He's pissed off more people watching their TV than Tony here has." Clint cautioned.

 

"Well..." Tony began, "I'd like to pride myself with pissing off a lot of people."

 

"The Interview?" Clint said, raising an eyebrow.

 

"The Press Conference!" Tony rebutted.

 

"The Interview." It was Natasha that time.

 

"The Press Conference!" He whined.

 

Both Natasha and Clint sat and stared at him. “Tony” Natasha said. “You only pissed off Phil with that. Literally no one else was offended by that.”

 

"Okay, fine, but that doesn't count!" Tony was glaring at them. Steve snorted. 

 

"That doesn't count?"

 

"Um... What's The Interview, and The Press Conference?" Bucky asked, shoving his face with pizza. "This is the best stuff by the way." He told to Rebecca, who turned red and looked down at her lap.

 

"Oh," Steve explained, "The Press Conference is when Tony told he press that he was Iron Man."

 

"And The Interview is on YouTube. You have to watch that at some point. You have to watch, like, everything on the channel." Clint interjected. (The Avengers did indeed have a YouTube account. Steve had created it at first, trying to find out what YouTube was. They then started posting random videos of embarrassing Avengers moments). Bucky's face was completely blank, he had no idea what this you tube thing was. Steve smiled sweetly. "I'll explain later. It's on the Internet, which is completely impossible to explain."

 

"Oh God." Bucky's head fell onto the table. His voice was a little muffled when he spoke next, "I'm never going to understand what's going on, am I?"

 

"Hey," Steve patted Bucky's shoulder, "I figured it out, didn't I?

 

They continued talking, though. Laughing and poking fun at each other, but Steve would occasionally have to explain a few things to Bucky. Thankfully, Coulson was good enough at his job that they weren't interrupted by SHIELD agents that wanted to question Bucky.

 

It was nice. They were falling into casual conversation, and Bucky seemed to be comfortable. Steve might be able to make this work.


	9. Chapter 9

Steve knew that at some point Bucky would have to talk to SHIELD agents about everything, he knew this, but that definitely didn't mean that he had to like it.

 

"Steve, you gotta stop being so god damn protective!" Bucky smirked at him one day after Coulson came to tell them about having to interview with SHIELD.

 

"Bucky." Steve laughed back at him, "You literally just came back to life. I'm going to stick to your side until you actually die."

 

"While I sleep?"

 

“Yep." Steve responded proudly.

 

"While I'm pissing?"

 

"Yep." Steve still sounded proud, but he was certain he knew where this was going next. Bucky knew that he knew, for he smirked before he said it. "Sex?"

 

"Yep." Steve was unwilling to budge. Tony snorted from across the room, "You know you could REALLY take that another way..."

 

Both men blushed darkly, "S'not what I meant." Bucky muttered under his breath.

 

"Just sayin'" Tony held his hands up.

 

*:*:*:*:*

 

 

Even though Steve was acting protective (it wasn't that much of an act, really), he did let the SHIELD agents interview and question Bucky later that day. He was in the room, right by his friend's side the entire time. Just making sure that they weren't asking anything that would make Bucky uncomfortable, or anything just plain rude. There were times where Steve would extend a comforting hand to his friend, and Bucky would take it, and forge through with how exactly the Hydra agents tortured him. (Steve had tried to make sure that they didn't ask him that, but Bucky told him that it was probably the only damn important question they have for me, so he'd better let him answer it, whether any of them liked it or not). Bucky did take his hand, though. To be honest, Steve had offered his hand partly so that he would have something to hold onto too. It was brutal, what they did to Bucky. Thank God for Howard Stark, Steve supposed. Howard Stark and his fancy technology that aided in Steve's transformation to becoming a super soldier. Sure it'd been bad for Steve, but this... This made Steve want to cry. 

 

Even the trained. SHIELD agents were looking a little disturbed at the horrible things that Bucky was describing.

 

"I tried pleading with them. 'Let me die.' I told them, over and over. 'Just let me die.' You hear stories about soldiers pleading to let them live, but I... Was different." He squeezed Steve's hand.

 

Steve pulled Bucky to him, and wrapped his arms comfortingly around him. Bucky leaned into the embrace, shivering slightly.

 

"It's okay." Steve muttered softly to him.

 

"Course it's okay dumbass." But it wasn't that okay, and they gladly ended the questioning there, as Steve ordered.

 

*:*:*:*:*

 

 

Steve spent the rest of the day showing Bucky the Internet, and Stark tablets. 

 

"See if you press here, a keyboard pops up. Type something."

 

"Just by pressing on the screen?" Bucky was incredulous.

 

"Yep." Steve seemed proud that he was able to explain modern things to other people. (Be it Bucky Barnes, who was as clueless as he used to be). Bucky stared down at the screen and he poked his finger to the 'c' button. It showed in the Google search box, and Bucky's mouth fell open in amazement. Steve grinned at Bucky's amazement. (It was adorable). Next 'a' was pressed, and it soon turned into a word, and then a phrase. Steve laughed when he figured out what Bucky was typing. Captain America. The first result was a YouTube video. 

 

'Captain America is fed up with your shitty parenting techniques'.

 

"Oh my God." Steve laughed. "That video. Okay just click on the title. Put your finger there." Bucky looked like a little kid who was just told the concept of Halloween for the first time. The video started quickly, (Tony could've only gotten the very best wifi available, and then improved it greatly himself).

 

The camera shook as Steve had pressed the play button. "Is this on? Tony, the green light means it’s on, right? Okay." He looked straight into the camera. "What the hell do you think you're doing? I lived in a frankly pretty bad period of time, and so I expected advances in pretty much every scientific field when I got here, and there were. Especially in technology and medicine. But I'm here to talk about vaccines. For those of you who don't know, how vaccines work is the dead version of the virus gets injected into your body, so that your antibodies will attack it, so that when the live version of the virus comes along, your antibodies know to attack and kill it, and you won't got sick. It works well, and it's only in very, very, VERY rare cases does a person have an allergic reaction to what's in the vaccine, and frankly, your doctor should know what you're allergic to. But NO! All of a sudden, some idiot comes along with the idea that vaccines ‘cause autism’, and everyone panicked. So there are WAY too many parents who aren't vaccinating their kids. It was fine with just a couple people, because herd immunity will generally save you. But now it's just ridiculous. Let me tell you something, before I got the serum, I was a depressing looking scrawny little punk who got in too many fights I had to be saved from, and I got sick a LOT. I had pretty much every disease known to man, and a couple even the doctors didn’t know what they were. Pneumonia several times, scarlet fever, horrible cases of the flu I nearly died from, and too many others to put in a short video. I went to the hospital more than most people. Honestly, they sent me Christmas cards. And guess what? Vaccines would've helped a ton if they'd been around. And it severely pisses me off that parents HAVE the tools to make sure that their kids don't get sick, but choose to stay in the fourteenth century because of a numbskull who said some crap on the Internet. So parents," Steve concluded fiercely, but with an amused glint in his eyes. "Vaccinate your kids." The video ended. Bucky still looked amazed. "Holy fuck. That had color. And it was, like, super clear." Steve grinned. Bucky looked up at him, "Do people really not do these things that could help children form sick?" Steve nodded, and opened his mouth to speak when Tony shouted from across the room, "Social justice rants!" Steve rolled his eyes, but didn't try to continue.

 

They continued going through silly videos from the Avengers YouTube channel, and catching up on news. Steve decided all of the interviews and press conferences would be saved for another day. He introduced Bucky to JARVIS. Bucky'd been completely astounded, until Steve had explained that Tony Stark had created him, and Bucky seemed to just understand that Starks could do pretty much anything. Tony gave them an all-inclusive tour of the tower, with the instructions to never go into his lab without himself first allowing it. Bruce said hello, but not much since he was carefully dripping some substance in some other substance, and Steve wasn't quite sure whether it was going to explode or not.

 

Which brought them to Bucky's sleeping arrangements.

 

"Well," Bucky teased, "Steve DID say that he was going to watch me as I slept, so..."

 

"Hey now." Steve was laughing, "You know we've slept together be- fuck that came out wrong." Bucky dissolved into childish giggling. Tony was staring wide-eyed at Steve, grinning. "Captain America! I had no idea you had such a dirty mouth!" They all started giggling with Bucky at that point.

 

"I meant we have slept in the same bed- God- you know, when I've been real sick but poor enough that I couldn't go to the hospital. You took care of me." Steve had stopped laughing. So did Bucky. Tony was just smirking at them both.

 

"Steve." Bucky told him. "We are full grown adults. And you aren't sick. I'll be fine. Just give me any of the three million rooms in this place." Tony started rambling on about which suite he could have, when Steve piped up, "There's an empty room next to mine." Despite what Bucky had said, he looked slightly relieved. "I'll take that one." Tony looked surprised, but nodded. "Steve I suppose can show you to your room. I just gotta nip into the lab to help Bruce. I think he's working on the shampoo." Steve had no idea what that was supposed to mean, so ignored it. Steve got to Bucky's room, and was pointing to where the bathroom was, and how to get to the main Avengers floor where they all gather in the morning. He paused before he left.

 

"Something wrong, Steve?"

 

Steve just pulled him into a tight hug. "I'm so glad you're back, Bucky." Bucky was hugging him back. "Me too."

 

"If you need anything, just wake me up. Seriously." Bucky nodded. "Thanks Steve." For explaining things. For being his friend. For being there. For understanding.

 

"I know." And he did.


	10. Chapter 10

Steve was usually he first one of them to wake up, except on the less-than-rare days that Tony stays up all night in the lab. So when he woke up and found his way to the kitchen and was smelling coffee and burnt toast, he just assumed that Tony was working on the shampoo all night. He wasn't expecting to hear crying. 

"Tony?" Steve asked tentatively into the kitchen. There was a sniff from behind the island. There was also a piece of burnt toast on the counter next to the toaster, half buttered. Steve wound around the island to see Bucky sitting on the floor, leaned up against the counter beneath the slice of toast. Steve rushed to his side, sitting down, and put a comforting hand on Bucky's shoulder. "What's wrong?" Bucky looked up at him with red eyes. "How am I supposed to live in the twenty first century if I can't even work a fucking toaster?" So this was about the burnt toast?

"Buck. It's one of Stark's toasters. He makes things overly complicated. As a matter of fact, that thing over there is a coffee machine- so I'm told, I'm not entirely sure I believe that- but I just wouldn't let them throw out the old one because I had no idea how to work out how to use this one. JARVIS still has to help me with electronics sometimes. When I first arrived a year or so ago, I was more hopeless than you are. And then I had to fight aliens! I had no idea what to do, but I survived. And I love it here now. I mean, I would still like to go back in time and see the forties again, but I don't think I'd leave forever. You'll be fine. No you'll be great. I promise." Bucky had stopped sniffling. 

"Do you want me to teach you how to use Tony's overcomplicated toaster?" 

Bucky nodded, and Steve pulled him up by the hand. He threw out the burnt toast, and started showing Bucky how to use the toaster. 

At some time during lunch Steve suggested that Bucky see the Smithsonian that day, and Bucky teased him incessantly about "Whatever it was that made you so embarrassed at the pizza place."

Natasha rolled her eyes at this. "I've been to that exhibit several times, and there's nothing there that would make Steve em..." She trailed off staring at Bucky. "Embarrassed. Sorry. Lost my train of thought." She looked at Steve questioningly, and his ears turned pink. 

"Anyway." Natasha continued, looking back at Bucky. “I'd put on a hoodie, a hat at the very least. You are famous, Bucky. People would recognize you, especially in the Captain America exhibit. And I don't think that you want the media on you quite yet. And we'll get people when that happens, but for now, you need to disguise yourself when you go out in public."

Steve definitely agreed. He wanted to keep Bucky safe from the harsh light of the media for as long as possible. He knew firsthand what they could do, and Bucky didn't need that. 

So after they cleaned up from lunch, Bucky borrowed a shirt from Tony because he had the size closest to Bucky's. (They would have to go shopping at some point for him. He only had the clothes that were on his back when he woke back up). 

They took one of the quinjets, because it was faster than taking a cab or any sort of car. Bucky was a little bit nervous. Understandably so, seeing as he sort of died in a plane last time, but Steve was able to calm him down for the most part.

They arrived at the museum, where they both kept their heads down, not particularly wanting to alert anyone as to who they were. Bucky wasn't going to be wasting any time looking around at 'boring museum things' heading straight to the Captain America exhibit. 

"God, I remember that stupid thing." Bucky motioned towards the original Captain America uniform. Steve smiled. "Yeah. It wasn't much designed for battle. Mainly just parading me around to be a picture for the war and patriotism and all that." Bucky rolled his eyes, "It was stupid, though, wasn't it?" Steve nodded in agreement. Bucky's eyes wandered away, catching sight of the display of drawings. Steve winced, almost feeling to physical pain of the (granted; unlikely) impending rejection. "No, Buck, you don't need to see those, come on, look over here." He tried tugging on Bucky's arm, but that did nothing but to amuse him slightly, and cause him to look at him funny. Though, Steve supposed, it did distract him from the display that made the portrait of Bucky the prominent picture. Bucky couldn’t yet see what was on any of the doodles and drawings yet, but Steve was certain that he soon would.

“Come on Steve, you can’t possibly tell me that it’s your art that caused you to be embarrassed to come here. Jesus, your art is fuckin’ incredible.” They’d been walking closer to the display the entire time, and finally they were standing right in front of it. Bucky let up a slight gasp. He didn’t know what to say, how to respond. “Steve...” He looked over at Steve, who still had a light blush tinting his face; he knew Bucky was talking about the middle drawing. The portrait of Bucky.

“It’s amazing. You really have to stop hating on your art.” Steve’s face had continued to turn a deeper shade of red throughout the entire conversation. “I- I- it’s not-”

“If you were about to say that it’s not that good, I will run you through with the knife I snuck through security.” Bucky looked at Steve to say he was serious (but not really).

“I’m just saying, Bucky, I’ve done better, and I’ve done worse, but this is some of my worst, I mean- look at that tree.” He motioned to a doodle of a tree in the lower left hand corner.

“It’s better than anything I could draw. And we both know that I wasn’t talking about the tiny little tree. The thing of me?” Steve was embarrassed that Bucky acknowledged the portrait. Bucky did a double take. “Wait? That? That drawing? That’s why you were embarrassed to bring me here? Christ Steve, it’s beautiful. I- I mean-“ He backtracked, “Not that I’m being narcissistic or anything. The drawing is beautiful.”

“No,” Steve interjected, “You are beautiful.” His eyes grew wide and he turned bright red again. “I didn’t mean it like-“

“Yeah I know.” Bucky said. There was something in his voice that Steve couldn’t quite decipher. Bucky smiled. “I know what you mean.” He told Steve, finally moving on from the drawings and doodles of Bucky, a tree, and even a bowl of fruit. (“How lame.” Bucky would later tell Steve).

“There.” Steve told his friend. “The Bucky Barnes section. Told you.” While Bucky read the poster, Steve wandered over to the kids’ corner with a plastic table. And little colorful kiddy chairs that you see in schools, except smaller. Steve sat down in one of the chairs, grabbing a paper and crayons, and started to doodle.

Bucky finished reading the information about himself, and walked to Steve to peer over his shoulder. He’d finished doodling a fight with a Hydra agent. Bucky snorted, “See Steve? Your drawings with freaking crayons, are better than mine with a pencil.” Steve jumped, surprised by Bucky’s sudden appearance behind him.

“No one’s drawing with crayons actually look good.” Steve told Bucky as soon as he recovered from the shock of Bucky coming behind him. Bucky just laughed at him. “Jesus Steve, how many times do I have to tell you that your art, is kind of amazing and belongs in a fucking art museum.” Steve punched Bucky softly on the shoulder. “Don’t swear.” 

“Steven Grant Rogers. You fucking hypocrite.”

“Not that- that.” He pointed over to where two children and their mother had walked into the exhibit. One of the kids actually had an entire Captain America suit. On a closer look they could see that the other child was wearing a replica of Bucky’s famous blue jacket.

“Look mommy!” The Captain America child said, “It’s Captain America!” His mother didn’t look in the direction that her son was pointing. “Yes dear. It’s an entire exhibit about Captain America.” The child continued tugging on her wrist and pointing to Steve. Bucky knew that the child would eventually get his mother’s attention, and alert her to the fact that it was, in fact, Steve Rogers standing over by the kiddy corner. And when that happened, Bucky didn’t want to be there, seeing as he wasn’t technically supposed to be alive right then. So, as Bucky predicted, when the mother turned to figure out why her child was pulling on her wrist and looked at where he was pointing and saw a very real and alive Captain America standing with crayon drawing in hand. He smiled at them all. The small boy and the mother walked over to him, to get his autograph and whatnot, except the girl in the Bucky coat hung back to survey the scene. As her eyes slid from display to display, her eyes eventually landed on Bucky. She just stared at him for a second, before her eyes wandered over to the Bucky Barnes poster. She looked back to Bucky and her eyes went wide as she looked from display to display several times, before Bucky smiled slightly. He raised a finger to his lips to tell her not to tell her mother or her brother about him. She broke into a grin. Bucky smiled back, more convincingly now, before glancing over to see Steve posing in a picture with the small boy. The mother soon seemed to remember her other child, and motioned over to see if she wanted to meet Captain America too. The girl didn’t, and she soon left the exhibit with the rest of her family.

“Smart girl.” Bucky said to Steve, stepping out of the shadows, Bucky looking a little sad, trying to hold a strong face. Steve looked at him funny, “What for not wanting to talk to me?” Bucky just snorted. “For that? No, that was stupid on her part. But she recognized me.” Bucky motioned over to the display with his face on it to offer half an explanation as to how she’d done it. Now it was Steve who’s eyes widened. “Seriously? She knew that you were Bucky Barnes, not just that she’d seen your face somewhere?”

“She actually recognized me.”

“Well, aren’t you kinda worried about her telling people?” Bucky shrugged. “Nor really, I mean. I don’t think she will, and plus, if she does, who’s gonna believe that she actually saw the dead Bucky Barnes in a freaking Captain America exhibit?” Steve peered at him for a moment. “Are you all right? You seem... distant.” Bucky shook his head, the slight gloom that had been hidden before came full out now. “I’m fine. Just. Uh, while I was in the corner, there was another poster about my history. And... and it mentioned my sisters and that... they died.” Steve’s face fell into a look of sympathy. “Bucky...” He wasn’t sure if he wanted to say he was sorry, that he knew how he felt, or something else entirely, but he just didn’t say anything. So Steve just hugged him.


	11. Chapter 11

They went to the rest of the museum in the end, Steve actually hadn’t seen a couple of the exhibits, so it was an adventure for both of them.

 

Steve definitely kept a protective eye on Bucky the entire time, making sure no one could recognize him again. They’d just finished with the dinosaur exhibit, when they got a call from JARVIS summoning them home.

 

“Why?” Steve asked, having enough fun with his friend that he didn’t want to go home. He’d gotten a bit defensive.

 

“It is best for you both to come home. Mr. Barton is coming with the quinjet.” JARVIS replied, giving away no sign of what was wrong.

 

“Is Bucky in danger?” At the sound of his name, Bucky turned to look at Steve, slightly alarmed. There was a pause before JARVIS’s answer that concerned Steve. “No. Not exactly, but it is in both of your best interests that you and Mr. Barnes return back to Avengers tower immediately.” JARVIS disconnected.

 

“Bucky, we’re leaving. JARVIS told us something was wrong and we have to go back to the tower.”

 

Steve was panicking on the quinjet ride back, coming up with the worst possible solutions: Hydra, AIM, et cetera. And yet, each time he had to think to himself that if Hydra or AIM had actually attacked, JARVIS probably would’ve told him. No, he would’ve gotten the Avengers Assemble signal. When they arrived at the tower, Steve opened his door and helped Bucky out of the jet, pulling him by the hand. Bucky just shook his head, “I can move myself Steve. I’m not three.” Nonetheless, Steve didn’t let go- still slightly fearful for Bucky’s life and health. Tony was waiting for them on the roof of Avengers tower, which did nothing but peak Steve’s panic, and concern Bucky more than Steve grabbing his hand. Tony smirked, “Well, that’s not going to do anything to stem the rumors.” Steve blushed and dropped Bucky’s hand. “What rumors?” He asked, hoping it was just the crack theory that he and Bucky were dating in the 1940’s.

 

“That’s why you’re here.” Damn. Steve had hoped that Tony might’ve just been teasing them. He just hoped to hell and back that Bucky himself hadn’t been roped into it. They were at the main floor before anyone would explain what was going on.

 

“What rumors?” Steve repeated, less uneasy, and more demanding now. Everyone was there, except Thor, who was off-planet and dealing with something on Asgard.

 

“Captain Rodgers.” JARVIS spoke to him, “Next time you choose to go outside with Mr. Barnes, we would advise you also wear a disguise. At least until you both feel comfortable telling the media and general public that Mr. Barnes is alive.

 

“This was taken and posted two hours ago,” A photo was projected onto the wall of Steve hugging Bucky in the museum, From the angle of the photo, thankfully, you couldn’t tell who Bucky was, but it was obviously Steve. The article, posted with the picture was about ‘Captain America’s secret new boyfriend.’ (Bucky in the picture was at least, obviously male).

 

“Jesus Christ.” Bucky growled, glaring at the article that JARVIS had now pulled onto screen.

 

“Right.” Steve said, somewhat nervously. “They don’t know who it is, so as long as I don’t go out in public with you again until they know that you... well, aren’t dead. And if no one-” He glared at Tony. “Tells the media about it, we’ll be fine.”

 

“Hey!” Tony exclaimed, “Why are you looking at me?”

 

“Because even I know that you have a reputation for saying extraordinarily stupid things to the media.” Bucky told him, somewhat amused- despite how angry he was. They all knew it was true. The Press Conference aside, Tony was usually the one telling the press dumb things that would get him in trouble with the public and Pepper. He’d told more reporters than any of them could count to ‘fuck off and leave us alone.’ Of course this just pissed reporters off, and made Pepper yell at him, so it didn’t really do him that much good.

 

*:*:*:*:*

 

 

They’d decided that they shouldn’t let Bucky or Steve out of the Tower for a while. That way, they wouldn’t run into any more people with cameras that could potentially figure out that Steve’s ‘secret new boyfriend’ was actually Bucky Barnes. Bucky, though, was beginning to get a little stir crazy.

 

“No, Stark.” Bucky told him, starting to look a little bit more like the sniper that he used to be. “I refuse to watch another fucking movie about robots. We watched the thing with the white robots.”

 

“That’s Star Wars- and they’re not robots they’re Storm Troopers.” Tony glared at Bucky.

 

“Whatever. I don’t particularly care. I didn’t like it that much.” There was a strangled cry of surprise from Tony, which Bucky promptly ignored. “Right, and you made me watch that animated one called WALL-E. That one, I’ll admit was pretty good, but-”

 

“You cried.” Steve interjected. “But I agree with Bucky. No more robot movies.” Tony glared half-heartedly at Steve and scoffed, “Of course you’d agree with him.” Bucky tensed up, and turned to look at Tony again, “And what exactly, is that supposed to mean?” Bucky snarled. Steve jumped in, trying to stay stern, but his eyes clouded with concern. “He just meant that we’re good friends,” He turned to Tony, voice becoming sterner, “Right, Tony?” He emphasized. Tony raised his eyebrows and mumbled something under his breath. Bruce’s eyes widened and he punched Tony’s shoulder. “Tony! That’s rude if they say they aren’t, then I believe that.” Tony looked skeptical. “You had to have wondered at some point.” Bruce flushed slightly as he replied. “Well, of course I’ve wondered, but that doesn’t mean that I actually said anything about it.”

 

“Well why not?” Tony asked, and Bruce scoffed at him, looking rather incredulous. “Because it’s rude, and I’m respecting their privacy. If they were... then they’d tell us in their own time. You really need to stop prying, Tony. It’s pretty much out of control.” Now it was Tony who scoffed, “I’ve always been nosy. Don’t try to change who I am.”

 

“Could you two cut it?” Natasha glared at the both of them. They jumped and looked at her, surprised. Steve looked grateful.

 

“Honestly.” She continued glaring at them. “We all know what you’re talking about, and Bruce, while it’s nice that you’re trying to get Tony to be less of an ass, you’re being rather rude about Steve and Bucky yourself. Now go.” They both looked rather sheepish, and they turned and walked out of the room.

 

“Natasha?” Clint asked, “Did you just send two grown men to time out?” Bucky snorted, and the tension in the room thinned out a bit.

 

“Well, um.” Steve said, “It’s still movie night. What should we watch?”

 

“Have you seen Blues Brothers?” Clint suggested, and both Bucky and Steve shook their heads. “Right. Okay, that’s not okay. You two need to see that movie, it is amazing. It has music and fucking Illinois Nazis.”

 

“Illinois Nazis?” Bucky questioned.

 

“I hate Illinois Nazis.” Clint grumbled. Natasha laughed, while Steve and Bucky just looked confused.

 

“Come on,” Clint said, “JARVIS, couldja get the movie set up?” JARVIS did as Clint asked, but didn’t reply.

 

The movie started, and everyone calmed down and relaxed. Bucky sighed, and leaned against Steve’s shoulder, feeling content for the first time in weeks.


	12. Chapter 12

“Kay, Buck, I told you about Peggy being alive, and I think It’s time you meet her.” Steve announced one day.

“How bad is she?” Bucky asked somewhat apprehensively.

“Alzheimer’s.” Was Steve’s only response before he led Bucky down the street to the nursing home.

The receptionist recognized Steve as soon as he walked in the door. She smacked her lips, and they could see the bright pink bubble gum in her mouth. Bucky cringed.

“Ah, you’re here ta see Peggy and the likes aren’tcha? She’s doin’ well today, pretty clear. Do ya want me to tell ‘er you’re comin’?

“No, I’d like to surprise her today.” Steve smiled warmly at the receptionist.

“Alrighty then, go right on up.” She grinned at him, obnoxiously pink lip gloss disorienting and distracting Bucky for a moment before he followed Steve up.

Steve knocked on one of the doors, Bucky could only assume was Peggy’s room.

“Yes, come in.” And it was. Bucky could recognize her voice from anywhere. He could vaguely hear a cooking channel on in the background. Steve walked in first, motioning for Bucky to stay in the hall for a second.

“Hey Peg.” He grinned at her.

“Well. If that isn’t the happiest I’ve seen you since the war.” She grinned right back at him.

“I- uh, I wanted to bring someone for you to see.”

“Oh! Steve, have you finally dropped that silly notion that you have to wait for me to die to date people?”

“What? No- no it’s not like that.” Steve turned bright red, and he could hear snickering from the hall. “Shut up!” He glared fondly toward the source of the noise. “You can go ahead and come in now.”

Bucky came into the room, dramatic as ever, flipping the hood off his head.

Peggy gasped. “No.”

“Hey Peggy.”

“James Buchanan Barnes, you nearly gave me a heart attack.” But she smiled as she said it. “Come here and give an old woman a hug.”

Bucky complied, a sloppy grin across his face.

They talked for a long while, longer than the visiting hours allowed for, but Steve was Captain America so that didn’t matter much.

But finally, Steve led Bucky out of Peggy’s room, and to another room down the hall.

“Wait,”

“I want you to meet someone else.”

“Alright.” Bucky looked confused. Steve knocked softer on this door, in case the person inside was already asleep. But sure enough, a voice echoed out from the room, male this time, telling them to come in.

Steve opened the door, ushering Bucky in this time, instead of having him wait in the hall.

“Oh, Steve.” John was staring at Bucky.

“Yeah. He’s awake.”

Bucky felt awkward, not entirely knowing how to react to any of what was happening.

“Bucky,” Steve seemed to almost read his mind, “This is John. He helped me get through Peggy’s Alzheimer’s.”

“I’ve heard quite a lot about you.” Something twinkled in John’s eyes that Bucky couldn’t quite place. He held out a hand for Bucky to shake, which he gladly did.

“All good things I hope?” Bucky quipped.

“Oh definitely.” John laughed, looking to Steve, who- quite confusingly to Bucky- bowed his head and blushed slightly.

“So how have you been adjusting to the 21st century?” John asked as Bucky swore that he had some sort of ulterior motive to all of this.

“Well, government’s still shit, apparently all Starks are the same. Still got Steve.”

John beamed.

“Well, Bucky. That’s fantastic to hear.” He winked at Steve, “Now you two go along and have fun, I need my rest. Come back anytime.”

When Bucky turned to Steve, he was surprised to see that he was bright red.

“Alright, John,” Steve quickly gained his composure.

He grabbed Bucky by the elbow, leading him quickly out of the room.

“Hey, what’s got your panties all in a bunch?” Bucky asked, a little concerned.

“Nothing, John just likes messing with me. He’s really sweet guy.” Steve smiled fondly, but was still blushing from ear to ear.

“Didn’t seem like he was messing with you to me, but I’ll take your word for it.”

The lip-smacking receptionist grinned at them as they left. “Y’all come back now, ya’ hear?”

They hurried their pace just a little.

“Jesus,” Bucky muttered, “She is the most southern person I have ever met. And that includes that girl Sally Perkins from the bar you hated.”

Steve laughed. “Oh my god, I remember her! She literally looked like a hillbilly farmer. It was over the top- I remember wondering if it was actually real, until she started talking and everyone knew that she was fake as shit. Her ‘southern twang’ was atrocious, and she called you ‘honeybun’. It was sickening.” Bucky laughed too, remembering too, “And then, I remember when we had sex, she lost the accent entirely.”

“Oh ew, I do not want to hear who you had sex with. You’re disgusting.” Steve shook his head, but was still smirking.

“Hey,” Bucky laughed, “You’re gonna get a lot more into my sex life.”

Steve blushed deeply, and could barely get a word out in his flustered state.

“Jeez you’re easy to get a rise out of- I see you’re just the amount of innocent virgin that you were back in the forties.”

“I am not- okay I might still be a virgin, but I sure hell am in no sense of the word innocent.”

Bucky gasped, thrilled, “Captain America!” He exclaimed faux-scandalized, “Who knew you were so kinky! What would the country think of you! Why I bet some old Sally Perkins is clutching her pearls and saying ‘Oh my stars’.” He quipped in his worst southern accent.

Steve let out a laugh, leading to them both dissolving into giggles.

They fell into the common area in Stark tower, still giggling and reminiscing.

“See, I had no fucking idea what to say!” Steve shouted, to a surprised Tony Stark.

“So I just told her the most interesting thing that I’d learned in years.” Tony hadn’t ever seen Steve this happy and hyper.

“No, I was literally sitting there,” Bucky said, an equally dopey grin on his face, “Going, ‘Steve, goddamn that’s interesting, but not the most appealing thing to say at a dinner date.’”

“What?” Tony felt like he’d landed in something that he didn’t want to know about.”

They both cracked up, clinging to each other so they wouldn’t fall over.

“See-” Steve tried to talk, “I was on this double date with Bucky,” He paused to snicker, “And the girl asked me how I liked my dinner. And I panicked.”

“No shit you panicked.” Bucky teased.

“I panicked. Because at the time I was this tiny scrawny thing, and the only reason she was on the date with me was because Bucky had been the one to set it up, and so I said,” Steve had to pause to take several shallow breaths to try to calm himself down enough to say words.

“I said, in this terrified, and somewhat horrified tone: ‘Goldfish have teeth in their throats.’” He and Bucky returned to the hysterics that they’d entered the tower with.

Tony was silent, not sure what had just happened to him. “Are you two… high?”

This only made them laugh harder.

Tony saw Natasha entering the room cautiously, she glanced over at him with a raised eyebrow.

“Apparently goldfish have teeth in their throats.” He offered.

Steve positively cackled, and Bucky actually did fall on the ground, screaming “Stop, I’m gonna piss myself!”, causing Steve to shriek with glee.

Within the hour, the rest of the Avengers were in the room, and Steve and Bucky were telling stories of their time in the forties. To Tony’s relief, neither one were laughing so hard that they were in danger of pissing all over his couches. The same could not be said for Thor, who would laugh heartily at any glimmer of humor.

“Oh so there was this one time,” Steve looked over at Bucky to see if he would remember as he continued, “Where I was sick as fuck, and Bucky was trying to make me feel better- be even the slightest hint of happy, so he was trying to cook,”

“Oh no!” Bucky interjected, “No, don’t tell them this story. This story sucks ass.”

“This story sucks nothing, let alone ass. This story is awesome. So Bucky is trying to cook, and he’s chopping up a bunch of shit for a stew, and I’m watching him from the bed- keep in mind we were literally staying in a one room apartment at the time, it barely had a toilet, let alone walls to divide rooms.”

“Oh yeah! I forgot about that place. That’s the one where the cat fell through the roof, and the asshole old crotchety landlord tried to get us to pay for it.”

Steve nodded, “Yeah, but you’re trying to distract me from telling my story. I know your underhanded tactics, Barnes.”

“Oh yeah.” Bucky drawled, “You know all my ‘underhanded tactics’.” He put on the creepiest sexy voice he could, made some vaguely vulgar hand gestures, and winked at Steve, who to his credit didn’t blush.

“Like you said, Sally Perkins would be horrified at what I’ve seen.” Somehow Steve was able to beat Bucky’s sexy voice- making it deeper, slower, and more gravelly

It was Bucky that blushed this time.

“Damn Rogers. But I seem to remember mentioning that old lady Perkins would be horrified at how kinky you are.”

“Um, I would like to interrupt by asking what exactly you mean by this conversation,” Tony said, raising a hand. “Because you’ve got me interested in what exact kinks you seem to think Steve has.”

“Oh you so want some of this.” Steve retaliated, gesturing down his body, and then cheekily motioning directly at his crotch.

“Okay, first of all- that’s disgusting, you’re turning ninety seven this year, second of all- that’s disgusting, my dad was into you, third of all- I just wanna know all your dirty secrets because I miss no chance to find new blackmail material.”

“I bet he’d fuck someone with his uniform on.” Bucky proposed.

Steve shrugged, “Sure.”

Tony gave him a weird look.

“What?” Steve defended, “That thing makes my ass look fantastic.”

There were murmurs of general agreement.

“Hey,” Bucky realized, “Your old costume was in the museum, what’s the new one look like?”

Clint was the first one to pull it up, finding several to show it from all angles.

Bucky peered at it closely, “Damn your ass does look fantastic.” He turned to look at Steve, smirking, “I’d fuck you with that uniform on.”

Now Steve did flush red. He punched Bucky’s arm a little harder than he needed to. “Now I see why you wanted to see that uniform- you wanted an excuse to stare at my ass.”

“Right if we could stop appreciating Steve’s admittedly fine ass and get down to the real business of how smitten Tony is with Steve.” Natasha teased.

“What?!” Tony jumped, “I’m not smitten with Steve, I’m not anything with Steve. The most I have to do with Steve is the fact that I can agree that he’s nice to look at and yes, that uniform is suspiciously tight around his ass.”

“Relax, Tony.” Clint said, “She just likes messing with you.”

“Aww, Clint, you’re no fun.”

“Anyway!” Steve chimed in, “Bucky was chopping stuff up for a stew.” Bucky let his head fall and hit the wall behind him.

“And I’m still not sure how it happened, because I slipped off to sleep, but I woke up and Bucky was trying to get me out of bed, because it was on fire.”

“You wanna know what happened?” Bucky asked, head still thrown back in a display of dramatics. Steve nodded enthusiastically.

“I was lighting the stove, and before I let go of the match, I saw you passed out, so I went over, praying to god you weren’t dead.” Bucky lifted his head to look Steve in the eye. “I accidently set the mattress on fire in my attempts to see if you were breathing.”

“Oh.” Steve didn’t seem to think the story was funny anymore.

“We had no idea what you had, Stevie. That was terrifying, not knowing whether you were gonna live or not, because it wasn’t something we’d dealt with before.”

Steve gave him a sad smile. “I think I know how you felt.”

They smiled gently at each other for a while- maybe too long, because Tony starting pretending to gag. Natasha hit him across the head, but still laughed.

Something stirred inside Steve. His feelings for Bucky had been relatively on the lie low, having been too worried about Bucky to think about himself, but now after today… what with Bucky looking at him with such a sweet expression, and literally telling Steve that he would fuck him, albeit jokingly.

This wasn’t going to go well for Steve, he knew it.


	13. Chapter 13

It was the next day that Steve and Natasha were taking Bucky out to do some major shopping. Natasha kept walking up to Steve with old man clothes, and holding them up to him. 

“Hmm,” Bucky considered, “I think his arms are too big for that top. Usually old guys are tiny and frail. You aged weird. You were this tiny frail dude in your twenties, and now you’re nearly ninety-seven, and you’re the buffest piece of shit in New York.”

Natasha nodded gravely. “We’re going to have to go up a size.”

Steve punched them both.

“But, Natasha,” Bucky warned, “If we go up a size, It looks like it’ll be too long.”

Natasha gasped, “This is a crisis. Houston, we have a problem, I repeat, we have a problem.”

“You guys are assholes.” Steve glared.

“Why Houston?” Bucky asked, genuinely confused. 

“Oh. Yeah. I guess we didn’t tell him.”

“Houston is where NASA is located.” Steve offered, “NASA is the organization that sends people into space.”

Bucky dropped the suspenders he’d been trying to give to Steve. “The fuck?” 

“I guess we hadn’t sent anything up yet.” Natasha realized.

“Yeah, we went down in ’42 I think, so I know Sputnik wasn’t a thing, but was there anything else?”

“Germany was working on something, but I have no clue.” Natasha admitted.

“But yeah, Bucky. We’ve sent people to space. First moon landing happened in ’69.”

“We got people to the moon?!” Bucky hissed, trying to keep his voice low as to not attract attention.

“Oh yeah. We’re heading for Mars next. Though that’s not gonna happen for a while. But there’s people in space as we talk. International Space Station.”

Bucky looked like he was, well, over the moon, but decided to continue this line of questioning later when there weren’t so many people around. He picked up the suspenders and shoved them in Steve’s arms. Natasha grinned. “I’ve taught you well.”

They eventually found their way out of that store, and through what felt like hundreds of others. Steve and Bucky were exhausted by the end of it. 

“You’re both old. You can’t keep up.” 

“Natasha, I haven’t eaten in hours.” Steve complained. Bucky agreed. Natasha sighed.

“Fine, we’ll get something to eat.” 

“And then we leave.” Steve pushed. “We have hundreds of dollars of shit here, I feel dirty.”

“Whatever, old man.”

They found their way to the mall’s food court, where they settled down with obscenely expensive burgers.

Steve could tell that even Natasha seemed glad to be able to sit down, but didn’t bother mentioning it. That wasn’t an argument that he could win.

They were quiet for the first few minutes, content to just eat. Until:

“She’s cute, Steve.” Natasha nodded towards a blonde girl on her right. “You should ask her out.”

“Wow, you’re really getting desperate.” Steve looked at the girl, “She’s clearly on a date.” Their eyes all slid to the woman across from her. As if to prove Steve’s point, the blonde reached over and held the other’s hand. Steve looked smugly at Natasha, who seemed annoyed.

Bucky was still staring at the pair incredulously. “How can they do that? Aren’t they afraid that someone’s gonna rat them out?” He whispered to Steve and Natasha.

Steve looked at him for a second. “Oh.” He said quietly.

“I’m gonna let you take this one, Steve.” She picked up her trash, and walked in the opposite direction of the nearest trash can.

“Um. It’s- they- I- um. It’s legal. Being gay. Won’t get kicked out of anything, or arrested, or any shit like that anymore. It’s actually legal in New York to get married now.”

Bucky stared at him, dumbstruck, and for a moment, Steve was scared he would scoff and say something bigoted.

Instead, his voice was soft. “Really?” There was something in his voice that Steve couldn’t quite place. 

Steve nodded.

And Bucky promptly started crying. 

Steve startled, and moved around the table to comfort him. He was absolutely bewildered as to why Bucky was crying. 

“Hey, hey, it’s fine.” 

Bucky looked up at Steve, beaming brightly as he wiped his face. “I know.” And somehow Bucky seemed to think that made any sense.

“Listen, let’s go, I think… I think we should talk.” Steve felt his chest buzzing with nerves. 

“Okay.” Bucky sniffed, “Just give me a second. You go on and find Natasha.” 

Steve agreed, and walked over to where he could easily see a red-head staring at them intently.

“So did you tell him?” Natasha asked curiously, as they both watched Bucky go over to the two women on a date. 

“Tell him what?” Steve decided to play dumb, busying himself with getting the last of his coke.

“Oh I dunno, any number of things. That you’re bi. That you’re in love with him.” She said it so casually. 

Steve choked on his drink. “I’m not-” He reddened, and Natasha rolled her eyes. “It’s pretty obvious.”

Steve looked over at her- a little fearful. “Does-” He abandoned all attempts to hide it in his desperation to know that Bucky still had no idea how Steve really felt about him.

“Bucky’s oblivious. But you should tell him. If not just because then you’ll have a chance, but because he doesn’t deserve to be lied to.”

Guilt swirled through Steve’s torso. He didn’t feel like he was lying to Bucky, just… leaving a few things out. He expressed this to Natasha.

“Do whatever you want. I just think you should tell him.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He sassed, trying to gain his composure as Bucky started walking back towards them.

*:*:*:*:*

 

Bucky glanced over at Steve, making sure he was walking away and not near enough to listen. He steeled himself and walked over to the blonde and her date. They looked up at him curiously as he approached.

“Hey, um… You don’t know me, but I just wanna say thank you.”

The blonde’s date smiled, seeming to understand. “You’re gay too?”

Bucky nodded, shuffling his feet.

“I’m Michelle. This,” she motioned to the blonde, “Is Lily.”

“I’m, uh, I’m James.” He said lamely. He took a deep breath, “You’re the first people I’ve told. I’ve known since I was about ten. I, uh, I grew up in a pretty shitty place. Didn’t really know who I could trust, so I just kind of…” He laughed to himself. “When I was in my twenties, I would go on double dates a bunch. I would meet some girl and her friend, so I’d invite her on a date, and tell her friend that she’d love my friend Steve. I’d always kind of pretend in my head that I was actually on a date with Steve. But I’ve… I’ve been given a second chance with Steve. Not that he’s interested, he’s just some all-around stand-up guy that’s too nice for his own good. I’ve been given a second chance to at least be around him.” Seeing the confusion on Michelle and Lily’s faces, he explained the best he could. “We were both in the army, some shit went down and I haven’t seen Steve for a lifetime. 

Just met back up with him a couple weeks ago. But it’s a weird feeling, I could just… tell people now? I thought I’d never live to see that. I didn’t tell Steve, some dumb fear that he’d turn me in, gotten me killed. Not that he’d even think of doing that, just… Living there was difficult.”

“I hope you get your Steve, James. I’m sure he’ll accept you, he sounds like a sweet guy. Even if he’s not interested, he’s not going to hate you. Here,” She dug around in her purse, and grabbed his hand, starting to scribble her phone number on his wrist.

“Call me if you need anything. Even if it’s just to talk.” She smiled at him encouragingly.

“Thank you again… It’s good to see that I’m not the only one.” Bucky shoved his hands in his pockets, and walked over to Steve and Natasha, flushing slightly.

“James Buchanan Barnes,” Natasha scolded, “Did you just get that nice girl’s number? I thought she was on a date.”

“S’not what it looks like.” He grumbled, not even noticing that Steve was looking intently down into his cup, careful to not meet Bucky’s eyes. Bucky was too busy avoiding looking at Steve to realize.

*:*:*:*:*

 

They made it back to the Tower, lugging their clothes and the likes with them.

Steve and Bucky seemed to have gone back to normal, with Bucky teasing Steve about something that happened some eighty odd years ago.

After dumping the shopping bags on his floor, Bucky found his way back to the common area where Steve was sitting.

“So, uh, what was it that you wanted to talk about?” 

Steve sighed, he’d kind of been hoping that Bucky had forgotten about that. Steve and Bucky were alone in the room, which made it easier. Still, Steve was going the easy (cowardly) way out of the closet. 

He grabbed his computer, sitting on the coffee table.

“I’m going to show you one of the videos on our YouTube channel.” He told Bucky, as if psyching himself up to do it.

He was able to bring up the video in little time, but hesitated before he pressed play. His hands were shaking. Bucky didn’t think he’d ever seen Steve so nervous.

“Hey, if you aren’t ready, I get it. I don’t know what this is… but if you don’t want to show it to me, then I’m fine with that.”

“No… it’s something I have to do, and I should do it sooner rather than later.” Steve huffed a sigh, and hit play on the video simply titled ‘The Interview’.

Bucky looked at the screen, still not used to the HD quality of the videos.

‘So,’ The reporter was asking Steve in the video, ‘Coming from the 1940’s which is was a very unaccepting time period, how do you feel about the new acceptance of gay rights and gay marriage?’ 

‘Oh it’s great!’ 

‘It’s great that everyone is so much more accepting. Everyone seems to be so understanding of everyone. The entire LGBT community is very open now, and it’s so great.'

‘So, you agree with gay rights and gay marriage?’

‘Have I not made myself obvious enough? Of course I do! As I’ve mentioned, Tony’s dad was in love with me, and I was fine with that.’

Bucky laughed, remembering when they’d figured that out. 

‘Honestly, it’s great that people are so open about their sexuality and gender identity. But it’s horrible that people feel bad enough of the few people that are homophobic, biphobic, or transphobic, for them to commit suicide, it’s absolutely disgusting.’

‘People normally just generalize as homophobic and transphobic. What do you mean by biphobic?’

‘Biphobia. People who aren’t actually scared of bisexual people, but are disproving of what bisexuality is. And, if you don’t understand, bisexuality means that you can be attracted to both men and women.’

‘So a mixture of heterosexuality and homosexuality?’

‘No. Bisexuality is a different thing altogether. Like, chips is completely different from cookies and cake, and it’s not a combination of the two.’

‘But, eventually you could settle down and have a partner, and surely-’

‘If you’re about to say that you have to decide once you settle down, then no. That’s wrong. There’s this great actor Anna Paquin, who said that even if you’re straight, and you settle down, it doesn’t change your sexuality any.’

‘But surely if you’re labeling yourself as ‘bisexual’ then you just haven’t figured out who you like yet?’

‘No. We are not confused. We haven’t ‘not yet chosen’, we know that we’re attracted to both men and women.’ 

‘Are you saying… that you are… bisexual?’

‘Yes.’

The video ended. 

Steve sat tensely, staring down at his hands.

“So that’s what you wanted to tell me?” Bucky asked, looking curiously at Steve.

“Yeah… Sorry I wouldn’t tell you earlier, it’s just, I mean, you know how it was back then. I should have trusted you, but you never know what people could have heard, and-”

“Steve, I don’t care, I get it.”

“Really?” 

“Course.”

There was silence for a moment, Bucky trying to figure out how to word his statement.

“Thanks.”

“I’m gay.” Bucky blurted, staring at the laptop intently.

“Wait, what?”

“I’m gay. Known since I was ten.”

Steve blinked. “But-”

“All the girls were just a ruse.” Bucky supplied.

“Oh.” Pause. Suddenly Steve seemed indignant. “Then why’d you have to drag me along with you, I was miserable, every girl you tried to get me to date hated me.”

For an inexplicable reason to Steve, Bucky looked panicked at the question.

“Steve,” He croaked out. “I… They were double dates, but I would…” Bucky’s breathing grew faster, and he could feel himself shaking.

“But I would pretend that- that… that you were my date.” Bucky was staring at the ground with no intention to look anywhere else.

“You… You wanted me to go on a dinner date with you.” Steve’s voice was a lot calmer than he was.

Bucky nodded jerkily.

“Why?”

“Don’t make me say it.”

“Please.” Steve begged. He had to know. He had to make sure.

“I was- am- in love with you.” Steve barely heard it, but he could hear the words replaying in his head, over and over.

“Well.” Steve leaned back against the sofa, looking straight ahead. “There’s this nice Italian place a block away.”

He could feel Bucky freeze next to him.

“What?” Bucky asked, monotone and surprised.

“If you still like Italian, that is.”

“Steve.”

“Or there’s a nice place that has steak if you want something fancier.”

“Steve.”

“What?”

“Are you asking me on a dinner date?”

“Yeah.” Steve smiled softly.

“Italian sounds nice.”

Steve giggled giddily. He leaned in, still grinning. “May I?”

Bucky didn’t even answer, just grabbed Steve’s face and kissed him. 

They backed away after a few moments. Steve grinned cheekily. “Hi.’

“Hi.”

They laughed, although neither really knew why.

“Steve.” Bucky said again, smirking. “I don’t have any nice clothes.”

“Well,” Steve sighed, “You’re just gonna have to ask Natasha to take you out again, because I’m not seeing you there unless you look your best.” He teased.

“Oh I’m gonna look so fine you won’t even know what to do with yourself.” Bucky countered, standing up from the couch, “I’ll see you at six, Steve.” He said as he walked into the elevator.

Steve was grinning like a fool, staring at the elevator doors. 

He headed off to his room to grab his coat, he had one stop to go to before he started getting ready to go to dinner.


End file.
